Many Happy Birthdays and Elli's First Official Play Date

I know it's been a while since our last post but in my defense I have tried three separate times to post over the last weeks and each time the entry stuck because I tried uploading videos. We have some great videos of Elli but I have learned my lesson and will stick to just pictures this time.

We've been very busy lately celebrating birthdays (Grandma Lee Ann, Aunt Ehrin and Addie) and just having fun. Elli LOVES to clap and say YAY (or her version of YAY anyway). It's funny because she seems to especially love clapping for herself. She loves to sing, talk, laugh, play and is so full of smiles. She's started kissing too...it's very open mouthed and slobbery but of course we love it.

Rather than me write three thousand pages about all that we've been doing and enjoying lately I'll try to let our pictures do the talking.


The weather got a bit nicer a couple of Friday's ago so Elli and I ventured out for a quick (really, really quick) walk. I bundled her up and she seemed to enjoy it, but I decided it was still too cold. We can't wait for warmer weather to go for walks every day!


Aunt Ehrin's 30th birthday and Grandma Lee Ann's 50 something birthday was celebrated by going up north to the Essenhaus Inn and Restaurant. We had such a fun family time and we found out that Elli loves to swim. We went to the pool late on Saturday night destined to fail (time to eat, time to sleep, grouchy time) and she had a blast. When she wasn't trying to drink the entire pool she was laughing at Grace. The next day we went down to watch dad and Grace swim and decided to take off her pajamas and throw Elli in. Again, she loved every minute of it.


Elli's first official play date happened on Friday morning when Tegegn Ponsler. Tegegn was so much fun and it was fun to talk mommy talk with Sarah.



Happy 1st Birthday Addie! Addie is so adorable and such a sweet little girl. I think Elli tried to out-gibber Addie at times today and she did love playing with Addie's new toys. Addie did excellent with her own personal cake...definitely the best I've seen.







Elli's favorite foods right now: squash, pear sauce, cake and ice cream so she was in heaven!

Elli clapping:


This was the first time Elli was pushing the buttons herself. :)

Dadadadadadadadadadadadadada...

Elli's favorite word? Dadadadadadada! You say it and it cracks her up. She loves to say it herself! She started saying it on Thursday and hasn't stopped saying it yet.

Today was a big day for dada...he and his sixth grade basketball team won their County Championship. Congratulations daddy and Uncle Syd!!!

Here is some of the 'Nicholson Cheering Section'.

Not Pictured: Aunt Katie & Uncle Chris.

FINAL SCORE!

Elli wants to start crawling. She just hasn't figured out all the mechanics of it. I am positive she went one step two separate times yesterday. :)


Today, Elli tried (and loved) puffies and vanilla wafers. She's a terrific eater!

Revised: It All Started at Aunt Ehrins!

After Ehrin saw the last blog entry she told me this morning that something happened last week that I should know about. She started getting a little teary eyed and mentioned that she didn't tell me because she was hoping that Elli would do it in my presence. A little history: Ehrin and I have had the conversation about one of the hardest thing in leaving Elli each day is the fear that I'll not be there for one of her 'firsts'. Anyway, to make a long story short Elli said MAMA on Thursday!!! :) She's not done it again...so far she just loves any and all word starting with B, but I am so excited that she started with MAMA!! She's the most amazing blessing!!!

It All Started in the Panera Bathroom...

Today was a big day for Elli. After church we had lunch at Panera with my mom and dad and Syd and Katie. Mom went into the bathroom to help me change Elli's diaper before leaving and she just started talking up a storm...really talking...she's partial to any and every word with the letter B. Bla, blee, ba, etc. She hasn't stopped talking yet! Yay!

Aunt Sara, who is a pro at the barrette, suggested yesterday that Elli's hair was long enough to try. It's holding on by a hair or two, but it's in! :)

Elli also met her future BFF today. Tegegn came home today! Woo hoo! He's even more precious than the pictures showed. We are so excited that the Ponslers are home safe and sound and their family is plus one with the most adorable little boy!!!

Elli was full of smiles today (until the ride home at least). She liked talking to Aunt Katie! :)

Feedings, diaper changes and all Elli related items were taken care of by Grandpa and Grandma this afternoon. I think she's very loved...and she very much loves them!!

Momma's Girl

Elli's first Christmas was SO much fun! The holidays were even more amazing thanks to our new status of 'Elli's parents'. The three of us spent almost two and half weeks together and it was incredibly difficult for it to all end. We enjoyed spending several low key days together before our trip to Greentown. We had decided not to buy anything for each other and not too much for Elli. Not sure who we were kidding.

We got Elli a DVD player (for future use in the cars) and some Praise Baby DVDs (like Baby Einstein but with worship music behind it...it's great). She also got a couple of new toys - a stacker ring, etc. I'm glad we didn't get her too much more as she was definitely spoiled by our families.

The above is one of Elli's favorite toys (probably in between the Fisher Price laugh and learn puppy...it laughs, sings, talks, etc. and her cool new cell phone).

We celebrated with my parents and my mom's family on Christmas Eve, as is tradition. It was super fun...and lots of great food. We ate all night. Below is some of the chaos we saw when it was time for the kids to open presents. Grace was my absolute favorite. She was so excited and grateful for all of her gifts. She even enjoyed watching others open their gifts.

Us in our Christmas jammies...one of my favorite Christmas traditions.

As usual, Elli's grandparents spoiled us all rotten. We feel really blessed by everyone's generosity and thoughtfulness. Below is a picture of the girls in their matching Christmas outfit.

We played a ton of Rock Band over the break. Greg and I forgot that it was make believe at some points...more fans, more stars, more cities, more venues!!! Greg and his sister, Sara, are awesome at the drums. I prefer the guitar and Elli often sings along the few times she's been awake when we were playing. Greg's mom was the funniest. It was fun to watch Gary, Sally, Sara and Greg all play.

Us Mast girls kicking it!



We rang in the New Year at our house with some of Elli's favorites aunts and uncles - Dutch, Sara, Syd and Katie. Addie joined us for the party but she and Elli didn't make it to midnight (thank goodness)! Aunt Sara and Uncle Dutch got Elli the CUTEST pjs! Since we call Elli 'bug' this outfit fits her perfectly! :) We had a ton of fun hosting the VanDams for a couple of days. It went by too fast!

You'll notice my nifty new camera has some fun features. I was tired of every picture of Elli showing up with her having red eyes so I invested in a new one. I've had lots of fun playing with it.

It was hard to go back to work this week. On Monday I raced to my sister's house to get Elli. When I walked through the door Elli saw me and her arms and legs went crazy. She about jumped out of my mom's arms to get to me. When I held her she squealed and then just talked and talked to me. Turns out she was just as excited to see me as I was to see her...and her reaction was absolutely priceless. It made my year if not the next decade for me. Elli's turned into a bit of a Momma's girl over the last couple of weeks. She's starting to have a bit of the stranger danger disorder and likes to throw a fit when someone leaves the room. Elli is really growing into her own personality and can be a bit of a stinker sometimes. She doesn't do anything halfway it seems...when she screams, she screams; when she laughs, she laughs with all she's got; when she's wriggling, she's can move anywhere she wants. Hopefully she continues to live life big! :)

No true updates in terms of milestones - no teeth, no mamama or dadada, no crawling. I'm not in too much of a rush for any of the above. She's doing great sitting up and playing with all of her new toys, eating her fruits and veggies (and meat now!) and growing so much!

Tuesday was Elli's seven month birthday! :)

Happy Birthday, El!!

Elli Loves...

Here are a few of Elli's greatest loves:

-FOOD (any and all varieties...she does prefer homemade squash, but overall she loves to eat...make sure you are not in between she and her bottle as she will knock you down!)
-Patterns: carpet, upholstery, clothing, doesn't matter (she loves to look and touch patterns...especially carpet patterns)
-Her DADDY - he's the coolest person in the whole world; as soon as he walks into a room she lights up and starts smiling and laughing (she especially loves his funny voices)
-Mickey Mouse Clubhouse - especially the theme song and the Hot Diggity Dog dance (I have officially been inducted into the world of parenting as I've has both of these songs in my head for about a month and a half now...over and over and over and over)
-The Itsy Bitsy Spider - she likes to sing along with this one (and usually tries to be louder than whoever is singing it to her); generally all songs are all right with her
-Our Babysitter's Kids: Grace and Chloe
-Standing, kicking, grabbing, chewing, playing airplane, rolling, sitting up - as long as she's moving she's okay
-Her bug blanket - thanks Grandma and Grandpa Mast...she's loved this silky little blanket since she was about a week old
-Football - she does enjoy watching the occasional football game (she also enjoys her Chicago Bear teether...guess which grandparents that came from??)
-Coldplay Lullabies - it's a sure fire way to get her calmed down and to sleep (thanks Uncle Syd!)
-Her Changing Table - we have some of our funniest times on the changing table...I think it's because we are constantly talking and singing to her when we are changing her
-Baths - she seems to like baths but definitely not the being cold afterward part; she's just recently started trying to swallow all of her bath water
-Tags - it's amazing that she can have the funnest toy in her hand and the thing she goes for above all else is the tag; whoever made the 'taggies' toy line must be a gazillionaire

Other fun things we've been up to:

Elli's always been super ticklish but just recently she's really started laughing hard when being tickled. Greg has the touch...she rolls every time. We'll have to get a video of it and post it.

Going to Greg's basketball games. Elli seems to enjoy watching the boys play...until about halftime of the second game at least.

Grace's preschool Christmas concert. Elli was so great during it. She loves to watch other kids...part of the reason why I think she loves Grace and Chloe so much.

Elli's grandparents have come to babysit which is fun for Elli and also nice for Greg and I to get out. We've had a lot to celebrate lately so we've had some nice dinners out.

Greg and Elli had some daddy/daughter time when school was cancelled last week. I'm so grateful that we all three are off until January 5th! We are going to take advantage of this time together...and play a lot of Rock Band (after about two months of trying to validate purchasing this game for our Wii we finally got it...and it is SO much fun...totally worth it!!!!).

I'll try to get some videos and pictures posted soon. I just wanted to post something so that my sister would get off my back about 'being a bad mom' and not updating our blog. Elli is as cool as ever (actually cooler) and we are having so much fun playing and watching her grow. This Christmas already means so much more. I've been reading Twas the Night Before Christmas and The Shepherd's Christmas to Elli on a pretty regular basis. We are trying to share the true meaning of Christmas with her now...it might be a year or two until she gets it though. :)

Giving Thanks!

Aren't we all so incredibly blessed? To have families, friends, jobs, freedom...and the list goes on. I am truly thankful this holiday season for the blessings in my life. Our Thanksgiving was a good one. Elli started on vegetables Thanksgiving day. She celebrated with some carrots...it seemed only appropriate. She is really loving her food and seems to really enjoy the homemade apples that Aunt Ehrin mentored me through. I took the week of Thanksgiving off so Elli and I took a trip to Ehrin's so that she could school me on some baby food making. We made squash, sweet potatoes, apples, carrots and peas. It was pretty simple, cheaper than buying baby food and ended up being fun. Ehrin is definitely my mentor. I call her for every question, issue and panic attack and she calmly guides me through. I am so grateful that she is close to us and watching Elli.

I am also grateful for amazing friends. Elli has so many 'aunts' and 'uncles' in her life. From my good friends and accountability partners Katie and Heather to our much loved cousins Syd, Chris, Sarah and Katie (yes, I am mentioning Katie twice...I just love her so much and am SO excited for her to move right next door to us...come on, you know you want to!!!:) to Beth who is the most generous person I know to our Bible Study friends Justin and Audra. And the amazing thing is I could go on! We spent time with some of those aunts and uncles tonight - Chris, Sarah, Syd and Katie. We are so excited for the Ponslers travels to Ethiopia to pick up their long awaited bundle of joy. We can't wait to meet our newest cousin...we already love him so much!! The boys played Rock Band (or whatever it's called) and Elli seemed to enjoy it about as much as they did. I think they can take their show on the road. Elli and I could totally be groupies. Below Elli is watching Syd playing the drums. She alternated between watching Syd and looking up at Greg while he was singing.

Thanks Sarah and Chris for the Pumas...Elli's kickin' it in them for sure! :) I never thought I would have shoe envy toward my six month old!

Speaking of six months...HAPPY SIX MONTH BIRTHDAY ELLIOT! I took her for her six month appointment today and everything looks good. She's still pretty much off the charts for her weight, but she's now up to 12 lbs 6 oz! The funny thing is that she's technically not in 6 months clothes if you go by weight alone (most we have start at 12 1/2 lbs) but as you can see from the picture above she's already getting too tall for them. Do they make baby clothes in 6 month waist and 9 months length??? The doctor seemed to approve of everything we have going on with Elli including her development (sitting up by herself, grabbing things and switching hands, the feeding schedule she is on, eye contact, etc.). She also commended me for continuing to nurse Elli as she's been with me since the beginning struggles with Elli's weight...my goal was to get to six months and we made it! Who would have thought we would be able to do it!?!? When the doctor got to Elli's legs as she was checking out all of her joints she must have hit the tickle spot because Elli started cracking up as the doctor was moving her legs in circles. It was so funny. The next thing: talking. The doctor said she should be working out mamamama, dadadada, babababa any day. I'm betting on the mamamama first. :)

We are so thankful for Y-O-U! Happy Belated Thanksgiving!!